cardio vs cardio with weights

[omearaee]

Hello Cathe

I have I question to ask you and or the Cathe community. I have been doing mostly pure cardio workouts and now for variety I wanted to add cardio and weight workouts. How many a week should I do? Does it matter when I do them? Are they counted as a cardio workout or a strenght training workout? And do they really burn more fat than a regular cardio workout? I know I have asked a lot of questions but I am confused when it comes to this aspect of working out.


Thanks

Erin

 

[Connie1]

Hi Erin!

When you say for variety, you want to add cardio and weight workouts, do you mean you want to do mare cardio? Why not add pure weight workouts for variety? It's like saying I eat rice every day, but for variety I want to have some rice and beans. Well, where's the beef!?

Seriously, weight work will make you stronger, enabling you to get more out of your cardio workouts. You will be able to have a higher foot-pound output (burning more calories each cardio session, even just walking to the mailbox) once you build your strength. You will be able to jump higher, go longer, and perform with more satisfaction, thereby making each cardio session more fun and more motivating for you.

When you work out with weights, don't feel guilty that you're not doing cardio that day. Concentrate on the weights (not to say combo workouts aren't good, but in your situatuion, I think if you start out alternating all cardio, then all weights on different days it'll train your mind and neural pathways to perfom new weight moves safely and smoothly). Enjoy the break from cardio and concentrate on weights every other day.

Lower-body strength work might leave you "feelin'it" for a few days, so don't expect to do your most intense jumpin' cardio the very next day. Adjust your program to accommodate strength work and you will enjoy the ability to do more cardio, eating more of a wide variety of foods, weight control, shaplier legs, arms, and everything, and the ability to take on tasks of everyday life with more joy and gusto!

The folks on this board can guide you as to which Cathe videos will fill your needs best! I recommend all of them. I really like them all. Perhaps MIS (Maximum Intensity Strength would be a good starter, You can do half of it one day and the other half 2 days later).

 

[Connie1]

To answer you original question, I would count them as a cardio workout, and they burn about the same amount of fat unless you can feel that you are working unusually hard for a prolonged amount of time. Then it's more.

Also, vice versa. Let your perception guide you.

The more body parts at once that your heart is pumping blood to at once, the more the work resembles cardio, for example, Circuit Max with compound exercises is more heart-working than, say, CTX weight sections.

Edit: Cathe would be able to answer this more concisely! She has written an article on weights versus cardio which is where I got most of my information! I think it's available to read from somewhere on the Home page of this site!